Earthbound Zero
by Doused
Summary: A novelization of a game many people didn't have the chance to finish. A quest for the eight melodies and a chance to change lives and the world.


I'll be calling Ninten Ken here.

In the early 1900s a dark shadow covered a small country in rural America

At that time a young married couple vanished mysteriously from their home

The man's name was George

The woman's name was Maria

Two years later, as suddenly as he left, George returned.

He never told anyone where he had been or what he had done

But, he began an odd study, all by himself

As for Maria, his wife...

She never returned.

"Mommy..." he cried. Eyelids open slowly, weakly. Brown eyes behind them focused on the burning roof above.

Smoke scalded his insides. His body coughed, trying to expel the pain, but in doing so, brought more of inside.

He moved his arms, brining them up to his sight. The ragged scars of burns ran down his wrists and arms.

He squeezed his eyes shut again and pushed himself shakily to his feet. He's seen this before, many times. His breaths grew labored as the smoke filled the room, but he did not want to leave. For he knew what to expect pass the open wooden door with its many locks, all of them failing to keep hidden the secret inside.

His chest rapidly rose and fell. He didn't want to walk pass the door. He didn't want to look again. He had but a few seconds of air left, he had to move on. With eyes tightly shut he made his way through the doorway.

The air clears, his lungs greedily filled themselves. He paused to think. The air has never been this clean before. He thought he had finally made it to the end, he thought that his fears were now dispelled.

A rift opens between his eyelids.

Only death and fire consumed this room.

His eyes snapped open of their own accord, too eager to witness more.

People lay scattered on the floor, some still breathing others torn beyond recognition. The flames swallowed the bodies whole.

Beside him, a woman and man huddled together, their bodies stained with blood, their faces covered in burns. They held together a strange white creature, whose cries were the only sound over the flames. The only survivors. The ones who were cursed.

Burning tears soothed the burns of the boy.

The boy with the dark hair awoke to the sound of shattering glass. He sat up in his bed, with one hand he pulled close his precious teddy bear, while his other hand wiped the tears off his eyes. The nightmare had ended early tonight. That was something he was grateful for, but what of the noise that woke him up?

"Ken! Ken, help me!" His sister's cries broke the silence of him room. Another window shattered, the roof violently shook, threatening to collapse upon them.

"Minnie!" Ken yelled, grasping the air blindly for a light. An iron cold chain fell into his fingers and he pulled, instantly dispelling the darkness.

The ground groaned and shuddered, toppling furniture and sending the boy out of his bed and onto the hardwood floor. He shook off the impact and pushed himself up; he held on to his bedstead to avoid being tossed around like a rag doll.

"Minnie! Hold on!" He let go and fell to his knees. The earthquake smashed his head against his nightstand. He had no time to recover from the injury, willed by the need to rescue his little sister, he started to slowly make his way across his room.

Books, picture frames, and sports equipment rained down on him, falling from their positions and breaking down on the ground, like enormous raindrops from a fierce storm . He dodged most that he could, the others he had to endure.

The doorknob was just above him, he turned it as quickly as he could, but to his horror the door wouldn't budge. He tried all that he could, kicking, punching, swearing, but it was to no avail, he was trapped.

The cries from next door ceased ominously.

"Minnie!" he cried, pounding the door fiercely, his call was never returned.

"Minnie.." He fell to his knees, his hands still wrapped around the doorknob.

"Ken...hurry..." It was but a whisper. His sister was still alive.

The earth stopped moving. His last few possessions clattered on the floor. The baseball bat that his father gifted him rolled next to him. He tentatively grabbed it, staring at the deep cracks that ran down its body. He thought of using it to break down the door, but he realized the bat would break far sooner than the door broken down. He even gave his shattered window a thought of being an escape route, before remembering he was on the second story.

Trapped in his own room. He shallowly sighed. This was no time for self-pity. He needed a way out.

A shining light caught his eye. In the destruction of his room, a bulb of light still shone bright. Curious, he crawled his way to it, digging through all the rubble with his bat. He blew the dust off it, it was his bedside lamp, still going strong.

His fingers wrapped around the cord and tugged, but the light remained glowing brightly. Ken covered his eyes.

"Broken." he thought aloud, as he set the lamp aside. The lamp would prove to be of some use to him after all, it provided him with light, light that he could use to search through the wreckage of his room for something he could open the door with. He sorted through his possessions; school books, stuffed animals, and old videogames were all damaged in some way and nothing of use for him.

His lamp, thoroughly exhausted, flickered on and off. Ken rubbed his eyes who begged for the light to normalize. He set down the pile of junk he was looking through and picked up the dying light.

"Now...off." he pulled the cord over and over again, but the darkness and light continued fighting. Annoyed of the time he was having to waste, Ken decided to just unplug his light source. He jerked the power cord, the tenuous connection it had to the electrical socket severed.

The lamp shivered in his arms. Ken stumbled backward, sheltering his eyesight from the blinding light. He dropped the lamp expecting to hear the loud shatter of glass. The cackle of lightning resounded. The glow had receded and Ken opened his eyes with trepidation.

Before him, the lamp hovered in mid-air, possessed by some unknown force. Sparks and waves extended from its light bulb threatening to electrocute him. In a moment of cowardice, Ken had begun running toward his window, unwillingly screaming into the night air, knowing that no one would come rescue him.

Wires exploded from the possessed lamp, scattering ceramic chunks and dust into the air. They wrapped around the running boy's legs, toppling him over. Ken clawed at the cords in a futile attempt to free himself, his mind too frightened to focus on anything else.

The bands tightened, squeezing his ankles. Wires snapped on to his thighs and being pulled by some otherworldly force, it started to drag him toward the electrified mass of light.

Ken cried loudly, trying desperately to grab anything that came his way. His clammy hands failed to get a grip on anything. His tears were flowing freely down his cheeks. He twisted his arm toward his door, grabbing aimlessly at the air, as if he could somehow get up and open it.

"Minnie." he whimpered. The wires jumped forward, sending him closer to his demise. He shut his eyes for a second, trying hard to keep himself still. He was terrified but something had to be done. If he didn't, two lives or possibly more, would be lost that night.

He didn't have much time. He turned his head to the left, spotting his broken bat just a few inches away from his hand. There would only be one chance. He stretched out his arm. The bat brushed by his fingers, and was gone.

"Come on!" he strained. He tightly shut his eyes. He would have to do it. There was no other way around. His head quickly started burning with pain. His body screamed to stop what he was doing, but Ken would have none of it. His hand momentary glowed a bright red and the bat slipped into his hands. Wasting no time, he let the glow return to his hands and chucked the bat as hard as he could toward his enemy.

The sound of shattering glass rang in his ears. The bat smashed into the light bulb, sending pieces of glass flying into the air. The body hung lifelessly in the air for only a moment, before the decapitated mass of wires collapsed onto the ground releasing its evil grip on the room.


End file.
